Diaz Gives In To Propagandists, Resigns

• Yes, goldilocks, it's always "swift and resolute" with you when Cubans-Americans are involved; but how wonderfully lax and unjudgmental you become when handling Mr. DeFede's case. Yes, there is a distinction between DeFede and the fired/rehired Cuban-American journalists. DeFede by his own admission broke the law when he recorded surreptiously a conversation with a suicidal Teele (that the prosecutor refused to indict him does not absolve him of his self-admitted guilt). The 3 Herald journalists broke no law by working for Radio and TV Marti. In fact, the Herald has now admitted that in the past not only did it know and approve of its employees working at Radio Marti, but that it never formulated a consistent conflict-of-interests policy prohibiting them from doing so. Their firings were clearly arbitrary and without foundation and this injustice has now been rectified in the fullest measure possible, since, of course, it is impossible to undo the damage done to their professional reputation by ill-intentioned and misinformed people like you. "[R]eporters-on-the take"? To do what? Report their honest opinions on Cuba? I guess every reporter at National Public Radio (NPR) is on the take, because they also receive government checks for their work. Of course, they are paid to bash Bush, so that's O.K. The 3 Miami journalists bashed Castro, but clearly that isn't O.K. And how easily NPR reporters move in and out of the private sector without anyone questioning their objectivity! It's only when Cuban-American are involved that this becomes an issue. During the 60 years since the founding of VOA, thousands of professional journalists have worked for U.S.-sponsored broadcasting, including Edward R. Murrow, but it's only when this fact can be used to discredit Cuban-Americans that it becomes an issue. What's "clear as bell" here is your personal animus for the Cuban-American journalists and your disaapointment that justice was done to them.

• Hi Bob! I don't think you'll have a moment's hesitation with this one, but consider the following statement: <i>Anyone who is working or has worked for Radio Free Europe should be excluded from working for any "legitimate" news source.</i> Agree/Disagree?

• Goldilocks, Thanks for the oversimplification, we wouldn't have known what to think without it. It's not so simple. The aftermath of the piece has shown that the Herald didn't properly research its own story. That a rush to judgment was made without knowing all the details. Why would the paper only look at pay records dating back to 2004? Wouldn't they want to know who else was involved? You are right that these firings mirrored the Defede firing. Both that firing and these firings were hasty, and wrong.

• Funny that it didn't even take Mr. Diaz 24 hours to fire Jim Defede over journalistic "ethics" issues, the likes of which remain highly questionable and argueable, to this day. But, over what would be considered fairly cut-and-dried journalistic ethics issues -- accepting money to report propaganda as fact -- it took him three weeks to conclude it might be time to step aside. Funny how that works!

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